This year marks the 80th edition of the Lemon Festival in Menton. We must remember the readings of our adolescence, from a time when playing, entertaining ourselves, and reading enriched knowledge and understanding.
In this era, where a click can connect you from pole to pole or anywhere on our planet, it was inevitable to choose this bet of the English gentleman, to travel around the world in 80 days.
The novel by Jules Verne, an author already honored in Menton in the past, is leafed through page by page for the audience. All modes of transportation from the end of the 19th century and the most unusual ones are represented. The train is slow, its wagons gleam in the sun, followed by the ships. The Mongolia, which takes us from Brindisi to India, after passing through the Suez Canal, then arrives in those mysterious lands where the music, the women, their languorous dances and their sparkling clothes, hypnotize the soul.
The hero, a new Ulysses, meets a fascinating and cultured Indian woman. He resists her charm and continues his journey on the back of an elephant, to China, another boat, to Japan, and experiences different atmospheres, colors, and experiences.
After Asia, it’s America traversed by train, where the wagons are specialized, one for each use. Phileas Fogg has taken every possible mode of transportation and, from balloon to elephant, through trains and boats, he arrives in London, his starting point, and, having won the bet, he pockets the 20,000 pounds sterling, the stakes of this crazy challenge.
*Jules Verne was a visionary, and today even sailing champions are making world tours in record times. When you enter the Biovès Gardens, the book opens before you and from step to step, you will relive this thrilling adventure.
This magnificent journey does not suffer from jet lag, yet throughout your visit, you travel from country to country, and you too will make this world tour like Phileas Fogg. We note that the countries visited by the hero from the Nantes novelist are almost all planted with citrus fruits.
We should add that one must experience the Lemon Festival at least once in a lifetime.
Thierry Jan
